Video: Composing with the EFM1

Let's check out EFM1 in a musical example. I have got six instances of EFM1 that are creating all the synth sounds and bass sounds and pads, and then the drums were created by UltraBeat. So let's hear it and then I will show what's going on. (music playing) All right! The first thing I will show you is this SynthAccent track that we have got here.

Join author Brian Trifon as he shows how to improve music and audio productions using virtual instruments in Logic Pro. This course tours the program's virtual instruments, including the ES2 hybrid synthesizer, Sculpture physical modeling synthesizer, EFM1 FM synthesizer, the EVOC 20 vocoder, the Ultrabeat drum synthesizer, and the EXS24 sampler, and shows how to achieve various effects with each instrument's parameters. The course also covers working with oscillators and filters, understanding signal flow, creating custom synthesizer patches, adding effects, synthesizing speech, creating a library of custom sound samples, and much more.

Virtual Instruments with Logic Pro will be updating on a monthly basis, eventually covering all the virtual instruments in the application. Look for the latest movies here and on the lynda.com blog.

Composing with the EFM1

Let's check out EFM1 in a musical example.I have got six instances of EFM1 that are creating all the synth sounds and basssounds and pads, and then the drums were created by UltraBeat.So let's hear it and then I will show what's going on.(music playing)All right! The first thing I will show you is this SynthAccent track that we have got here.

So let me play that for you.(music playing)We can see on the interface when this one little accent happens--(music playing)--the FM Intensity knob is moving. That's because of the Track Automation onit that's doing that. (music playing)That's really the only modulation that's happening in this.There is no LFO or envelope amount that you can see.The other thing to take note of is that the Carrier is set to a fixed amount, soit's not tracking the pitches on the keyboard. So when I play--(music playing)--I can still play notes that will track on the keyboard, but that's because it'stracking the Modulation oscillator.

If I uncheck this, it's going to sound a lot different.(music playing)So it's one of those things we were experimented and it just sounded cool with thefixed setting. And on that particular note, the modulation sounded really good.The other aspect of the sound that gives it sort of the crunchiness that ithas is that the Modulator is set to a waveform that's not a sine wave.So if this was all the way to the left, it would be a sine wave. It's much smoothermodulation. But as I move this control, so let's hear that again--right, itreally changes the texture of sound.

So changing the wave shape of the Modulator really makes a big difference.(music playing)So the next sound in there is this Fretless Wave sound.I will show you what's going on with that.(music playing)It kind of has this vowel quality to it.It's bit of a growling sound.It's also pretty simple in its construction, and you can see that the movement isreally happening from this Modulation envelope.We have got the Modulation envelope applied to the FM intensity--that's thiscontrol here--and you can see what's happening is that when you play a note, thisFM intensity, over the period of attack, it opens up and then over the decay itcloses down and remains at the same level.

So if I just play some notes on the keyboard here--(music playing)--so you can hear how it has that movement just built into it.Part of the character of the sound, too, also has to do with this bus that it's sending to.So there are a lot of things going on in this bus. It's got an EQ, ClipDistortion, Space Designer, Reverb, Phaser.So let me mute some of these, so you can hear them individually.So here is the sound without any of those effects.

The Clip Distortion, what that's going to do is add in more crunchiness and more harmonics.So the Clip Distortion is a really good way to saturate the sound, and youcan get both really harsh and smoother types of distortion with it,so it's definitely worth exploring. (music playing)And so I am following that with the Space Designer, which instead of being setto a Reverb setting, it's set to a speaker cabinet.So with Logic there are some impulse responses that come with it that you canload into Space Designer that are models of speaker cabinets, and they have allkinds of other stuff too.

(music playing)That kinds of makes it sound more like it's in a room playing through a speaker,and I like the vibe. That sounds like guitar amp.Then there's a phaser which is just adding a little bit of slight modulation.(music playing)And then finally, it's being shaped by EQ.So now the reason why I have this on a bus is that I didn't want this to be afully wet signal, meaning I didn't want to apply this distortion and this SpaceDesigner just directly on the signal, so it's a 100% going through it.

I just wanted to add a little bit.So I can control that amount with this send control right here.So if I bring this down, it's not going to this channel strip at all.I can adjust the amount. (music playing)So I could even have it do quite a bit more. (music playing)And then if I didn't want it actually that crunchy, so I have found kind of anice setting in the middle where it blended well with this SynthAccent sound.(music playing)That sounds pretty good. (music playing)And the next setting we have got here is this FMOrgans.

So I will play that, take a look at the interface -(music playing)So the main thing that's happening here, it's really this Modulator, it's thewaveform in the Modulator is set to something other than a sine wave,so that's what's giving it a bit of crunch.There is also the Modulation envelope which is slightly modulating the FM intensity.So if I play a note on the keyboard here, we can hear just a little bit ofcrunch to it, and that's because of the Modulator waveform.

If I set it all the way to left so it's a sine wave, there's a lot less of that.(music playing)The other, and actually probably more important, aspect of the sound is theVolume envelope, or the Amplifier envelope.You can see that there is little bit of attack, so the sound is fading in, and italso has a bit of a release, so that it takes a moment for it to fade out.And so that's really what gives it the shape of the sound that makes it a pad,in terms of its characteristic.Then we've got the FM Reverb Stretch here, and what this is is at the end it'sjust sort of a washed-out pad. (music playing)It's in the background. (music playing)So you can see it's a 16-second reverb, fully wet, so it's just puts it in thebackground, and it's to add contrast and space to the rest of the mix.

You actually really can't hear much of the sound.If I get rid of this reverb, it's going to sound quite a bit different.(music playing)Don't hear that aspect coming through.I just wanted something in the background that was really spacey.So it's got the long reverb. And what the Tremolo effect it's doing is that'sworking an auto-panner, where it's panning back and forth between left and right.So let's listen to that again.(music playing)So the tremolo is usually going to be modifying the volume on the particulartrack that you have running through it, but it has a phase control so that'sgoing to make it function like an auto-panning. (music playing)Last but not least, we have got this other pad, this PostRockPad here.

(music playing)And so that's also a really washed-out sounds in the background.(music playing)If we take a look at this here, you can see that this is a pretty long reverb,17.8 seconds, fully wet.So it's just to push in the background.I will play for you dry so you can just hear what the difference and what it sounds like.(music playing) Kind of a very different setting.So Reverb really pushes it back. (music playing)So the last thing I want to show you is this Percussion part that's up top. So I'll play you that.

(music playing)Not necessarily that much going on in terms of the pitch, but it functions in the background witheverything else as part of the percussion.(music playing)So really what's creating this sound,so if I play this, and what gives it the metallic quality is the ratio betweenthe Modulator and Carrier.So notice that it's 4:9 and you can't really evenly divide 9 by 4.So when you have those kind of ratios you end up getting more metallic sound.

(music playing)If I were to change this to 8, it's going to be a little bit more consonant of a sound.(music playing)All right, so there is a little less edge to it, a little less metallic. And thenof course a big portion of the sound is the Amp envelope.It has a short decay, instantaneous attack.So I will set this back to 9, so we have got the more metallic sound.(music playing)I felt like that blended in well with the drums.So I'm going to unsolo this track here, and let's listen to the entire mix andtry to listen for how all these different EFM1s blend together.

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